A word from the healing "Doc"

It's as gloomy as the forecast, but I would expect Klein to be back enjoying his passions sooner rather than later. His fondness for cross-country skiing and the outdoors are about as pure as one can hope to find.

That became clear during a couple recent interviews on training. Our conversation ambled a bit, as I was curious to find out how he got started in the bike and ski biz.

Klein started skiing in 1972, after his wife turned him on to a sport she found at Nicolet College. It was a time when he mixed healthy outdoor activities with guitar-playing, singing and smoking in a few incarnations of a band known as County Trunk A.

"When I went out for exercise, it was really to get out for fresh air," he said. "I just wanted to get outside. I never got into the competition end until I stopped smoking cigarettes. Exercise became my next addiction, which it still is."

Klein, 53, quit the full-time musician gig in the early 1980s and opened his first bike shop out of his garage. He opened a store in Downtown Oconomowoc in 1985, then moved into a strip mall a few years later. He opened at his current Dousman location in November 2001, and his shop has become a hub for area bikers and skiers, with clinics and the infamous Saturday Drop the Doc rides.

I wondered how a guitar player/singer gains the knowledge to be an expert on bikes and skis.

"I had this passion to just know all there is to know about it," Klein said. "When I got into the ski and bike business, I had enough background, with just doing the sports before, and knew enough about bikes to get going, then I just started sucking up knowledge anywhere I could find it.

"From ski racing, I just learned about fitting and all that from different coaches."

Hopefully, he'll learn everything he needs to about recovery to lead those Saturday morning rides come Spring, or sooner.